Zoo Asks That Chimpanzees Not Be Shown in Super Bowl CommercialsAn Animal Rights Article from All-Creatures.org

FROM

The misrepresentation of chimpanzees by dressing them up as if they're
human beings, for example, can harm them because people don't see them as
being imperiled or endangered. Now, the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago, is
asking CareerBuilder.com not to run a Super Bowl commercial that
misrepresent chimpanzees. The commercial shows "mischievous suit-and-tie
wearing chimpanzees playing tricks on their human co-worker ..."

The request is stronger than previous ones because it's known from
research performed at Duke University that "Commercialized chimps dressed as
people -- even when running up big banana daiquiri bar tabs -- makes viewers
less concerned about the plight of wild chimps." Other research projects
support this finding.

In response to the request to pull the commercial, CareerBuilder.com
claimed the chimpanzees were not harmed in the making of the commercial.
However, this is not the point of the request to remove it. Rather, the
concern is that tens of millions of viewers will take away the wrong message
that chimpanzees are doing fine and that it's okay to use them in this way.
There's also concern that people will think that chimpanzees make good pets.
They don't!

It's also known that the commercials using chimpanzees aren't all that
effective despite what CareerBuilder.com claims. "Contrary to
Careerbuilder.com's suggestion that the commercials helped their business,
[Brian] Hare [of Duke University, one of the researchers involved in the
study mentioned above] said people who watched the commercials reported that
they found commercials with chimpanzees less interesting than those that
featured athletes, music and other things."

Marc Bekoff is a former professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
at the University of Colorado, a Fellow of the Animal
Behavior Society, and a former Guggenheim Fellow. In 2000 Marc and Jane
Goodall co‐founded Ethologists for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and in
2009 Marc was presented with the Saint Francis of Assisi Award by the New
Zealand SPCA. Marc has published numerous scientific and popular essays and
twenty‐two books including The Emotional Lives of Animals, Animals Matter,
Wild Justice: The Moral Lives of Animals, The Animal Manifesto: Six Reasons
for Expanding Our Compassion Footprint, and the Encyclopedia of Animal
Rights and Animal Welfare. His websites are marcbekoff.com and, with Jane
Goodall, Ethologicalethics.org.

Fair Use Notice: This document, and others on our web site, may contain copyrighted
material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owners.
We believe that this not-for-profit, educational use on the Web constitutes a fair use
of the copyrighted material (as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law).
If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond fair use,
you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.